To Vaccinate or Not---The Rat Flu Odyssey Continues

[MultiVerse]

Yeah, but, the pictures I see from India are of fat older people in oxygen masks. What are the statistics? Who is dying there?

In Brazil the first wave killed more old than young, now Brazil now has more young than old Covid patients in ICUs. The number of people aged 39 or younger in intensive care units with Covid-19 rose to more 52.2 percent of the total.

Like Brazil, the first wave in India killed more older people. As in Brazil the mortality pattern in India appears to have shifted. With the caveat data collection, as others have noted, is problematic in India the virus appears to be causing serious illness in younger people more frequently.

We do know health systems in India can’t cope with the number of patients so it's possible the pictures you've seen, not the the pictures I've seen BTW, represent older more affluent patients who can afford health care.

https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/braz...n-icus-2411355

[Benny Profane]

its everybody, almost all of them brown people,

if you wana say its only old people you find the stats

I think it would be pretty fucking big news if we suddenly heard that mostly young adults and adolescents, maybe even children, were dying in India. Sort of runs contrary to the whole narrative of these last fifteen months.

[XXX-er]

India still only has a death rate of 245 per million which is way better than USA at 1837 per million except India has 1.4 billion people, unofficaly there are more dead in India than USA but I think India will officially overtake USA in deaths from covid at some point

Young people are the new old people when it comes to covid

Covid is gona slowly pick off the vax hesitant, hospitols are now reporting >90 of covid admissions are unvaxed

HC resources wasted on unvaxed Covid cases could have been used on all kinds of other illnesses in the HC system so there is a secondary killing effect

The patient died cuz he never got care cuz a covid patent had their spot

[Benny Profane]

India still only has a death rate of 245 per million which is way better than USA at 1837 per million except India has 1.4 billion people, unofficaly there are more dead in India than USA but I think India will officially overtake USA in deaths from covid at some point

Young people are the new old people when it comes to covid

Covid is gona slowly pick off the vax hesitant, hospitols are now reporting >90 of covid admissions are unvaxed

HC resources wasted on unvaxed Covid cases could have been used on all kinds of other illnesses in the HC system so there is a secondary killing effect

The patient died cuz he never got care cuz a covid patent had their spot

If an honest study of the last was ever conducted, my bet is the conclusions would be quite the indictment on our hospital system in 21st century America.

[XXX-er]

I think you gotta get rid of the insurance companies

[Percy Rideout]

And in 1800 it was 30 years old.

This angle doesn’t get any press because it marginalizes the deaths of millions of people around the world. Just because people are living longer now doesn’t mean we shouldn’t care about them dying.

It doesnt get talked about because it hurts peoples feelings. Statistics aren't about feelings.

Ecology 201 discusses carrying capacity of a species population in an ecosystem. Using a simple example, when foxes overpopulate an area it is lack of resources and/or disease that will bring the number back down to what is considered the "carrying capacity" of the area.

When do we bring this same science to humans? Do we ignore it again because...feelings? We are the virus to mother earth. She will respond accordingly.

[PB]

Props to WA for being one of the top vaccinated state in the US. Stay out of Idaho and Wyoming

Attachment 376320

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...smid=url-share

Apparently, DC and Puerto Rico are now states, while California no longer is.

[summit]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...ife_expectancy

USA is 40th, Cuba is 46th but there have been years they were ahead

Canada limps in at 15th, used to be more like 11th before Fentynal

earlier on it read like you were making lame excuses as to why people died as if it didnt count

I don't think we disagree on the ALE stats.

I was pointing out the primary influencers of the stats (particularly infant mortality), particularly if you compare Cuba and the US, while suggesting some reasons that underlie those numbers.

I did dispute that murders (regardless of weapon), though tragic, significantly depress US life expectancy. Less than 1% of the US annual deaths (~800/100K) are murder (~5/100K). I think you agreed.

[bennymac]

You might consider adding in the fact that we don’t drive our behavior primarily by instinct - so we don’t face resource problems in manner that is comparable to a population of foxes.

[Skidog]

It doesnt get talked about because it hurts peoples feelings. Statistics aren't about feelings.

Ecology 201 discusses carrying capacity of a species population in an ecosystem. Using a simple example, when foxes overpopulate an area it is lack of resources and/or disease that will bring the number back down to what is considered the "carrying capacity" of the area.

When do we bring this same science to humans? Do we ignore it again because...feelings? We are the virus to mother earth. She will respond accordingly.

I agree 100%. Sad as it sounds things like the black plague, and covid are one of nature's ways to control populations. People are just another animal to ole mother nature.

Sent from my Pixel 4a (5G) using TGR Forums mobile app

[Percy Rideout]

You might consider adding in the fact that we don’t drive our behavior primarily by instinct - so we don’t face resource problems in manner that is comparable to a population of foxes.

Disease crops up due to overpopulation of the species and close quarters living, which brings the population in question closer to the carrying capacity of said ecosystem.

I am talking solely about the disease portion of "carrying capacity" (remember this is a conversation about a virus), and not really talking about resource allocation here, but okay.

[summit]

Disease crops up due to overpopulation of the species and close quarters living, which brings the population in question closer to the carrying capacity of said ecosystem.

I am talking solely about the disease portion of "carrying capacity" (remember this is a conversation about a virus), and not really talking about resource allocation here, but okay.

That is NOT what "carrying capacity" means in any context.

Disease due to overpopulation in the wild is directly related to less resilience/higher susceptibility due to malnutrition and other stress, and potentially, increased contacts between carriers.

In human society "overpopulation" is something ENTIRELY different than it is for wild animals because we have science, technology, medicine, cities, global air travel, modern agriculture etc. These same things influence the spread of novel pathogens.

A disease that takes out 0.2% or even 2% of the total population is not "population control" with respect to managing "carrying capacity" unless it is a permanent fixture in annual mortality (and perhaps many endemic pathogens each averaging such mortality rates over time). In human society an singular epidemic or pandemic of this nature causes consternation, grief, and temporary disruption in society within a generation... but not a big effect on population over time.

The Black Death: Plague and resulting famine/warfare wiping out 2/3 of the population of Europe, or various diseases wiping out 90% of the populations of North hand South America after European contact, that is a calamity on a scale that permanently alters the trajectory of culture and civilization for many generations.

[bennymac]

Disease crops up due to overpopulation of the species and close quarters living, which brings the population in question closer to the carrying capacity of said ecosystem.

I am talking solely about the disease portion of "carrying capacity" (remember this is a conversation about a virus), and not really talking about resource allocation here, but okay.

Maybe wait until you pass some higher level courses in ecology. Those entry level courses are pretty much pure memorization.

[Percy Rideout]

That is NOT what "carrying capacity" means in any context.

Disease due to overpopulation in the wild is directly related to less resilience/higher susceptibility due to malnutrition and stress, and potentially, increased contacts between carriers.

In human populations "overpopulation" is something ENTIRELY different than it is for wild animals because we have science, technology, medicine, cities, global air travel, modern agriculture etc. These same things influence the spread of novel pathogens.

A disease that takes out 0.2% or even 2% of the total population is not "population control" with respect to managing "carrying capacity" unless it is a permanent fixture in annual mortality (and perhaps many endemic pathogens each averaging such mortality rates over time). In human society an epidemic or pandemic of this nature causes consternation, grief, and temporary disruption in society within a generation.

The Black Death: Plague and resulting famine/warfare wiping out 2/3 of the population of Europe, or various diseases wiping out 90% of the populations of North hand South America after European contact, that is a calamity on a scale that permanently alters the trajectory of culture and civilization for many generations.

You alluded to it yourself. COVID is going to be endemic with us forever, and it is going to be a permanent fixture in annual mortality. You just undercut your entire point.

[ex-powderbroker]

FFS what a bunch of bull.

US life expectancy is #6 for G20 because, in order,:

AMERICAN EXCEPTIONALISM, WE’RE #1

wait, wut?!

[summit]

You alluded to it yourself. COVID is going to be endemic with us forever, and it is going to be a permanent fixture in annual mortality. You just undercut your entire point.

Not at all

The whole population death rates I mentioned, due to COVID, are quite high right now (approaching 200/100K in the USA depending how you calc it) and what you would see in the a novel pandemic (although Spanish Flu probably killed around 700/100K in the US, but maybe 1K+/100K globally). Could COVID have killed 2-4 million if allowed to burn wild? Sure. But we controlled it, in a subpar manner, and "only" 600K died so far.

When COVID becomes endemic, the annual incidence (and CFR) goes down vs novel pandemic due to a combination of immunization and acquired immunity and it becomes a tragically (mostly) avoidable deaths that has no real pressure on the population, kind of like seasonal influenza which is normally #9 on our mortality cause list for USA "only" killing 10-20/100K. Sad, but not a pressure on population numbers.

You'd need to almost double US total deaths per year, year after year, to get the US to zero population growth (considering ~4mil births and 1.2mil legal immigrants per year). I'm glad we are not relying on infectious diseases to manage human population numbers... prosperity, education, women's
rights, and access to birth control are much better mechanisms and far better for individuals and society!

[dunfree]

Do we trust Indian government stats? We know they are suppressing case numbers... perhaps the trends are accurate but not the totals?

Gotta be more trustworthy than made up PRC stats for the last year.

I suspect Indian stats might have issues because the base data collection is overwhelmed or not path robust, much like early Chinese stats possibly were, but with the filtering of a not quite as deceitful government.

[The AD]

Disease crops up due to overpopulation of the species and close quarters living, which brings the population in question closer to the carrying capacity of said ecosystem.

I am talking solely about the disease portion of "carrying capacity" (remember this is a conversation about a virus), and not really talking about resource allocation here, but okay.

If you take this to its natural conclusion then we shouldn't bother treating any medical conditions whatsoever because we're tampering with that carrying capacity for human beings. I don't think that's a leap anyone is willing to make.

[bennymac]

If you take this to its natural conclusion then we shouldn't bother treating any medical conditions whatsoever because we're tampering with that carrying capacity for human beings. I don't think that's a leap anyone is willing to make.

Undergrads after two pints of cheap draft are quite willing to promote those leaps.

[old goat]

The reason we have long life expectancies FOR ADULTS:

1. Clean water and sanitation
2. Vaccination
3. Hand washing, sterile technique, and anesthesia
4. Food and drug safety
5. Antibiotics (DISTANT 5th place)

The only components of modern medicine in that list are vaccines to an extent, antibiotics, and anesthesia which all came in the first half of the 20th century or before.

The primary reason the life expectancy NUMBER is up is because of reduced infant mortality which was the primary factor in lowering life expectancy averages overall... and the things that fix infant mortality are very similar to those that save adults:
1. Vaccination
2. Hand washing
3. Clean water
4. Pasteurizing milk
5. Teaching parents basic care

Dr. Semmelweis had hand washing figured out in 1847, and he proved it, but his conclusions were rejected in Continental Europe and he was ill treated for having made his breakthrough. It took Florence Nightingale to really get the concept of handwashing accepted and implemented in the mid/late 1850s in the British Empire and then beyond.... slowly... even though US surgeons were still wiping their instruments on their boots during the Civil War.

Young women were big beneficiaries of hand washing--they stopped dying after child birth when the doctors and others delivering their babies started washing their hands.

I thought it was just making more babies survive that made life expectancy jump so much. As in, the main thing. People still got old way back in the day. Once you got past 20 or whatever it was smooth sailing. Source: saw this on a TV show once.

Despite your seeing it on TV it is largely true. People did start dying in midlife when they stopped being hunter gatherers and farmers and moved into cities (or joined armies)--besides plague TB was a big one. Crowding and poor nutrition. So the expected life span of a 30 year old went down as man became "civilized" and only in the last century or two has gone up due to all the things that Summit mentioned--to what it was in prehistory and a little bit more.

Also things like heart attacks and cancer are not a virtual death sentence like they used to be.

People who have heart attacks may survive the first one more often but almost always die of heart disease within a fairly short period of time. The improvement in cancer survival is not nearly as much as most people think and has almost no impact on average life span. I don't know how much cancer is caused by the environmental pollutants of modern life--I doubt we'll ever know--but modern medicine is mostly concerned with counteracting the ill effects of modern life.

[dunfree]

My g-gfather spent his life a “cardiac cripple” in part because of childhood illness that’s since been eliminated, then died youngish (55) it wasn’t all big city evil.

[riser4]

My g-gfather spent his life a “cardiac cripple” in part because of childhood illness that’s since been eliminated, then died youngish (55) it wasn’t all big city evil.

Pretty much my grandfather too.

[bennymac]

Most heart attack sufferers I know went back to at least 80% of previous life/level of activity and are alive 10-15yr longer at least

Note I said “most”. Not all. But recovering from a heart attack is not a guarantee of death in the next few years unless you are elderly or have lots of other confounding and poorly controlled conditions.

[PNWbrit]

There are ways around this. Just look at discounts for health and wellness programs.

This.

[The AD]

The improvement in cancer survival is not nearly as much as most people think and has almost no impact on average life span.

I think you're wrong about this. For example, childhood leukemia was a death sentence not that long ago.